How to play Whist
Whist is a four-player partnership trick-taking card game played with one standard deck. It is one of the cleanest ways to learn the trick-taking family because it has no bidding, no melds, no special bonus cards, and no hidden contract. The game is simply about winning tricks with your partner while reading the suits that have already appeared.
This guide explains the classic Whist rules used by our online game: four seats, North-South against East-West, 13 cards each, a turned trump card, must-follow-suit trick play, and one point for every trick above six. It also covers examples, edge cases, partnership habits, and the differences between Whist and later games such as Bridge or Spades.
Setup
Whist uses a standard 52-card deck with no jokers. Four players sit around the table. The players sitting opposite each other are partners, so North and South are one side, while East and West are the other side. In this online version, you sit South, North is your AI partner, and West and East are the opposing partnership.
Shuffle and deal the entire deck one card at a time until each player has 13 cards. The dealer turns the last card dealt face up. The suit of that card becomes trump for the hand. After everyone has seen the trump card, it belongs to the dealer's hand like any other card.
Card ranking
Cards rank ace high, then king, queen, jack, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, and two. The ranking is the same in every suit. A higher card in the led suit beats a lower card in that suit, but any legal trump card beats all non-trump cards.
Turn Order and Tricks
The player to the dealer's left leads the first trick. A trick is one card from each player, played clockwise. The first card played to a trick sets the led suit. Every other player must follow that suit if they can. If you have one or more cards in the led suit, you must play one of them.
- The leader plays any card from hand.
- Each other player follows the led suit if possible.
- A player with no cards in the led suit may play any card, including trump.
- The highest trump wins the trick if trump was played.
- If no trump was played, the highest card in the led suit wins.
- The trick winner collects the trick and leads the next trick.
This repeats until all 13 tricks have been played. Since every card is dealt, no draw pile or discard pile exists during a Whist hand. Every choice comes from the cards you were dealt and what you can infer from the tricks already played.
Trump Rules
Trump is the suit that outranks the other three suits for the hand. If hearts are trump, the two of hearts beats the ace of spades when spades were led and the heart was played by someone who had no spades. A higher trump beats a lower trump, so the king of hearts would beat the two of hearts in that same trick.
Trump does not let you ignore the led suit. If clubs are led and you have a club, you must play a club even if you also have a strong trump card. You may play trump only when you are void in the led suit, or when trump itself was led.
Should you spend trump early?
Spending trump wins control, but every trump card is a limited resource. If your partner is already winning a trick, trumping that trick is usually a mistake. If an opponent is winning with a high card and you are void in the led suit, a small trump can be a strong play because it saves your high cards in other suits for later leads.
Scoring
After all 13 tricks are complete, count how many tricks each partnership won. The first six tricks are treated as the baseline. The partnership that wins more than six tricks scores one point for each trick above six. Seven tricks scores one point, eight tricks scores two points, nine tricks scores three points, and so on.
If North-South wins eight tricks and East-West wins five tricks, North-South scores two points. If East-West wins ten tricks, East-West scores four points. A single hand cannot tie because there are 13 tricks. Traditional tables play multiple hands to five, seven, or nine points, and our online game follows short whist: game points accumulate until a partnership reaches five. Scoring for a live table instead? The Whist score keeper handles tricks-over-six math with selectable targets and an optional honors bonus.
Examples
Suppose diamonds are trump and West leads the ace of clubs. North plays the seven of clubs, East plays the queen of clubs, and you have clubs in hand. You must play a club. The ace of clubs wins unless someone legally plays a diamond, which cannot happen while they still hold a club.
Suppose spades are led, but you have no spades. Hearts are trump. You may play any card. If you play the three of hearts and no higher heart appears, you win the trick even if another player played the ace of spades. If East later plays the jack of hearts, East wins because a higher trump beats a lower trump.
Suppose your partner North is currently winning with the king of the led suit. If you cannot beat the king without trumping, you usually discard a low card and let North keep the trick. Whist rewards partnership discipline: you do not need to win a trick your side is already winning.
Strategy Tips
Lead from strength
A long suit gives you chances to force opponents out of that suit. If you lead from a suit where you hold several cards, you may later see opponents fail to follow, which tells you they are void. High cards are strongest when they are supported by length.
Watch your partner
Whist has no table talk, so the cards themselves carry information. When your partner wins a trick, consider returning the suit they led if it looks safe. When your partner discards from a suit, remember that they may be void there and able to trump later.
Track the high cards
You do not need to count every card perfectly to improve. Start by remembering whether the ace, king, and queen of trump have appeared. Then watch the top cards in suits where you hold kings or queens. If the ace is gone, your king may become a winner.
Edge Cases and House Rules
What is a revoke?
A revoke happens when a player fails to follow suit even though they had a card in the led suit. In physical Whist, this is usually penalized because following suit is the central rule of the game. The online game prevents illegal plays, so a revoke cannot happen here.
Can trump be led?
Yes. Classic Whist allows a player who wins a trick to lead any suit on the next trick, including trump. Some later trick-taking games restrict when trump can be led, but that is not part of the simple Whist rules used here.
How is Whist different from Bridge?
Bridge grew out of Whist but adds bidding, declarer play, dummy, contracts, vulnerability, and a much larger scoring system. Whist keeps the essential partnership trick-taking decisions but removes the contract layer, which makes it much easier for new players to learn.
Common Mistakes
The most common beginner mistake is treating every trick as an individual race. In Whist, your partnership owns the trick together. If North is winning and East has already played, South usually gains nothing by playing a higher card. Save that higher card for a trick where your side is losing or where you need to regain the lead.
Another mistake is trumping too quickly. Trump cards are exciting because they can beat aces from other suits, but they are also the only defense when opponents lead suits where you are void. A small trump used on a trick your partner could have won is often worse than a low discard.
Finally, many new players forget who will lead next. Winning a trick is valuable partly because it gives your side the next lead. If your hand has a long suit ready to run, taking control is worth more. If your hand has no clear next lead, letting your partner hold control may be the stronger play.
Whist Variants
Different tables use different Whist variants. Some play to five points, some play to seven or nine, and some rotate the dealer after every hand. Some versions remove the turned trump card and instead choose trump by cutting the deck. Others use no-trump hands or add honors scoring for holding the ace, king, queen, and jack of trump. Knockout Whist turns the game into an elimination race: hands shrink from seven cards toward one, and a player who wins no trick in a hand is knocked out.
The biggest branch of the family is Bid Whist, the partnership game with an auction, jokers, a six-card kitty, and uptown or downtown play that holds a celebrated place in Black American card culture. Our Bid Whist guide explains how it works and how it differs from the classic game played here.
The core rules stay the same across those variations: four players, partnerships across the table, one card per trick, mandatory following suit, highest trump or highest led-suit card wins, and tricks over six decide the score. If you know this version, you can sit down at most casual Whist tables and understand the structure immediately.